Chapter Text
Ekqozi]kh: (v) to be abandoned. Literally “to be alone as one awakes.” Derives from akqodz| (to be alone) and i]khutz| (to awaken).
Once, long before we met the sister stars, a Three Stars warrior awoke alone one day in a mountain. Those who watched over him had left in the night, and he was stranded in a foreign land. He destroyed the mountain in his rage, but it was not rage at those who had left him to awake alone; rather, it was rage at himself, for committing the great betrayal that had forced them to abandon him. Once his rage subsided, he went searching, only to find himself in the land of the Twin Sun people. He approached them, but remained lost, for they all spoke the Twin Sun language, and they could not understand his tongue, nor he theirs…
Are you listening? Markus?
Did you already fall asleep?
MARKUS
Mark woke up with a start.
Sucking in a breath, he launched upwards into a sitting position. His hands flew up to his face and chest, frantically patting himself all over. His face wasn’t split in half anymore; his rib cage wasn’t shattered; he wasn’t in his suit. He was normal.
There was no blood. Mark felt confused for a moment. He could have sworn there was blood on him. It was probably just a dream, right? His breaths slowed and Mark gradually became aware of a low, mechanical buzz. That didn’t sound like home. His eyes were shut. When had he closed his eyes?
Mark opened them to find himself in a plain hospital room of some sort, sitting on a bed surrounded by whirring screens. He instantly recognized it as the Pentagon GDA hospital and his stomach dropped. Paneled steel was plated over the walls, and the door opposite his bed was an imposing, solid mass of metal and keypads. A cot made itself small in the corner, its blanket rumpled, with empty water bottles and food wrappers littering the floor around it.
But the biggest thing, the one that made a bolt of instinctive anxiety rush through him: Mark was alone. There wasn’t anyone there. He’d been alone while sleeping. Why wasn’t Dad there? The last thing he remembered was… a helicopter. A helicopter?
Mark grabbed his head. Flashes of snow, of red, and then the pieces fell together with a damning gravity: wherever Mark was now was where that helicopter had taken him, because it had taken him off of a mountain, and he had been crushed into a crater on that mountain, and his dad hadn’t been there because he couldn’t have been there, because he had flown away, and before that— And before that—
Nausea rocketed through Mark.
There had been blood. Enough of it to completely coat every inch of his skin, enough of it to cake and stick and flake away in whistling winds. There had been blood, and Mark felt the immediacy—the enormity—of that fact threaten to swallow him. It had really happened, all of it, right up to the last thing Dad had said to him before taking off. Thinking of that, more than anything else, made Mark’s stomach drop.
No. Mark gripped his hair, pulling hard enough to feel pain. He screwed his eyes shut, bent over, and focused on the acidic aftertaste in his mouth, the leftover of whatever physiological mechanisms healed him. It was stronger than usual. No surprise there, Mark guessed. Oh fuck. Oh fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck.
The door beeped and hissed. Mark’s head snapped up, his incoming mental breakdown derailed by a sudden flush of adrenaline. What the—
The door swung open to reveal Mom and Cecil, arguing in hushed tones. Over Mom’s head, Cecil’s eyes immediately found Mark and narrowed. Cecil stopped talking and they regarded each other for a moment, mutually wary, before Mom turned and gasped.
“Mark!” she cried, dropping her cup, spilling steaming coffee all over the floor. She rushed to Mark’s bedside and grabbed his shoulders. “Oh, Mark,” she said. “Oh, Mark.” Her eyes, rimmed with dark circles and dried tears, scanned Mark’s face. Mom’s hair was tangled and falling out of her bun. She was wearing different clothes than those Mark had seen her last in; she looked like she was wearing her grief in a noose.
“Mom,” Mark rasped. His voice broke, and then he was hugging her, and she was hugging him, and for one moment Mark’s earthly problems shrunk into something less terrible.
Cecil coughed. Right back to being terrible, then.
“Sorry to interrupt the reunion,” Cecil said from the doorway, “but we have some questions for you, Mark.”
Mom broke the embrace, rounding on Cecil with a set jaw. “For the last time, Cecil,” she hissed, “my son is innocent. I won’t let you interrogate him.”
Cecil held up his hands. “Woah there. No interrogations needed, Debbie. We just need to know what Nolan said to him.” Mark’s breath hitched, and he glanced quickly between the director and his mom. Had they overheard what Dad had said on the mountain?
“He just woke up. Can’t you give him at least five minutes to readjust?”
“It’s been more than long enough. We need answers, Debbie. Answers. We still don’t know why Nolan did it, or if there’s something else out there, or whether it was even of his own damn volition.” Cecil sounded tired, frustrated, as if this argument was well-worn.
Mom stepped forward and opened her mouth, but Mark cut in, holding his hands up. “Wait. What do you mean, long enough? How long have I been out?”
Cecil sighed and redirected his gaze towards Mark. “About two weeks.”
“Two weeks?!” He’d been unconscious that long? Unattended? In GDA custody? Fuck. Don’t ever let any humans get their hands on you, Dad’s voice echoed in his ears, what he’d said to Mark time and time again. Who knows what they’ll do. Mark squashed his rising panic down. He wasn’t listening to a-a fucking maniac any longer. The GDA only wanted to help, same as Mark. He lowered his voice. “I’ve been asleep for two weeks?”
“Yeah,” Cecil said. “It’s been a real shitshow too. Half the world governments on my ass, all the civilians panicking, every bureau and news outlet trying to get their hands on our intel. Trying to find out why Omni-Man lost his goddamn mind.”
“Where— Where is he?” asked Mark, suddenly, anxiety roiling low in his gut. “Did he leave? I just— He just sort of took off. I saw him go up, but…” I was too injured to stay awake, he left unsaid.
Cecil crossed his arms. “Yeah, he’s gone. We didn’t have tracking satellites on you Chicago onwards, but we caught a small object heading towards the edge of the system about five minutes after the earthquakes stopped. His trajectory didn’t change while he was in our radar. Wherever he’s going, it’s far away from here.”
Mark nodded weakly in acknowledgment. For some reason, that didn’t make him feel much better.
Cecil waited, but when Mark didn’t say anything else, he said, “Okay then. My turn.” He stepped forward and dragged a chair to the side of the bed.
Her bottom lip working, Mom looked towards Mark. “Are you sure you’ll be okay?” Her voice bordered on being a little too eager, and Mark could see the buried desperation in her eyes. Of course—she’d been waiting for answers too.
Mark swallowed. “I’m fine, Mom,” he said. “I can— I can talk about it.”
Cecil spread his hands, already sitting down. “See, Debbie?”
Mom tightened her lips, but pulled her own chair close nevertheless. As the metal screeched against metal, Mark took the opportunity to look himself over. He didn’t have any lingering wounds or scars—not that he’d expected to—but also he didn’t have any IVs or, stars forbid, surgical sutures. There were a couple electrodes taped to his chest, though, and Mark ripped those off. Some of the screens went dark.
Cecil cleared his throat, and Mark couldn’t stop his hands from quickly clenching, jumpstarted by instinct and nerves. Cecil eyed him warily, then sat back. “So,” he started, “why’d he do it?”
“What?”
“Why he killed the Guardians, Mark,” Mom said gently. “And why he did… everything else.” She blinked hard, then looked away, her hands gripping her purse too tightly.
Mark’s mouth was very dry. “But, uh—your drones were there, right? Didn’t you hear?”
Cecil raised an eyebrow. “Yeah, well, since you apparently had an entire secret language that you saw fit to neither inform me nor any other heroes about, we’ve been a little blindsided.”
Mark blinked, and then laughed a little, sheer relief sinking through his veins. Of course they didn’t know what Dad had told Mark on the mountain; they didn’t know any of what Dad had said. Mark hadn’t even remembered that they hadn’t been speaking in English. It was one of those things that was so familiar, you forgot it was even of any import until it was staring you right in the face. But a sour wave of apprehension chased the relief, and his chuckle died abruptly. Fuck. He’d have to tell them everything. Everything. His eyes darted to Mom (—more like a pet—) and his lungs seized a little.
Cecil and Mom exchanged an unreadable glance. Maybe they were wondering if he’d really lost it. Maybe he had. “Mark?” Mom asked, reaching out to his hand. Her eyes were wide, her heart thrumming nervously. “Was it really him?”
“Oh. Sorry,” Mark said. “Um, yeah?” He felt sick.
“‘Yeah’?’” Cecil repeated. “Yes or no, Mark. Was he controlled?”
Mark looked down at the clean white sheets, at his clean hands fisted in them. “No. He— he wasn’t.”
Mom let out a single choked sob, but Cecil ignored her and leaned forward, the American flag on his lapel glinting in Mark’s periphery. “Why, then?”
The words stuck for a second in the back of his throat, as if saying them would make it real. “Um, he said—he said he was trying to conquer, um, the world. Earth. Like invade it and take control and stuff, for Viltrum. Which is apparently an empire or something. I don’t know. I didn’t know,” Mark pleaded, suddenly desperate, looking up at them. “I had no idea about any of this.”
“An empire? Fuck.” Cecil dragged a hand over his jaw. “Just what I need. Did he say anything about this empire? What Viltrum is like?”
Mark shook his head. “No. Well—it’s pretty big and powerful. I think. He said that there were like—uh, three galaxies under Viltrumite control? And apparently, they’re big on, um, strength. And conquering stuff, I guess.”
“Three galaxies?” Mom echoed, her voice oddly pitched.
“Something like that. Maybe four? I don’t know,” Mark admitted. “It’s all a blur. Sorry.”
“Okay,” said Cecil, pinching his nose. “Did he say anything about their plans with Earth? What he’d been doing here?”
Mark racked his brain. What could he say? “No, not really. I think he was, um, weakening the planet? Getting it ready for takeover. And then I think he was going to start taking it over himself, and then, uh, other Viltrumites were going to come help.”
“Other Viltrumites?” Cecil questioned, alarmed. “When were they supposed to arrive? How many of them? Are they all as strong as Nolan? What are their militaristic capabilities?”
“I don’t know,” Mark snapped, then immediately softened his tone, rubbing at his arms. “He didn’t exactly tell me any of this before.”
Cecil, undeterred, leaned further forward, his eyes cold. “Were you supposed to be one of the other Viltrumites? Are you?”
“Cecil!” Mom’s voice was shaking with either rage or heartbreak. Maybe both. “My son nearly sacrificed his life for this planet. How—”
“I said no,” Mark defended. “I-I was. But I said no.”
Cecil held his gaze for a moment, before he sighed and relaxed. “I know. I’m sorry, kid. I had to make sure.”
They sat there in silence for a few moments, punctuated only by the soft whisper of Mom wiping her sleeve across her face. The tension in Mark’s shoulders had just barely begun to lessen, however, when Mom suddenly lifted her head.
“Why’d he leave, then?” she asked, her voice hoarse. “After all that, why not finish the job?”
Mark blanked. He couldn’t tell them—no way. They couldn’t know. They couldn’t, but that didn’t make Mark feel any less shitty for lying. All they wanted was to save lives, and Mark wanted that too, more than anything. Fuck. He looked down, his mind racing. What should he say?
“Mark?” Cecil asked.
“Um— For-for me?” Just go with it. “For me. And mom. I— I told him he had had a good life here, and that… and that Mom would probably die if Viltrum took over. And, well—I guess I got through to him.”
Mom started weeping again, harder this time, and Mark ignored the guilt sticking in the back of his throat. Cecil, however, furrowed his brow. “You sure, Mark? And then he just left? He didn’t say anything to you after?”
Mark nodded quickly. “Yeah.”
“Right,” he said. “Sure, kid. Is there anything else he said? Anything at all?”
“No,” Mark lied.
Cecil said, “Right, then. Great. All we need from you now is just a line-by-line translation of what was said before and during Chicago.”
Mark blanched. “No.”
“No?” Cecil leaned towards Mark again, his eyes narrowing. “What do you mean, no?”
“I–I can’t,” Mark blurted. Mom.
“We have news footage if you can’t remember.”
Shit. That was the opposite of what Mark wanted to hear. “No! I don’t want to talk about it. I can’t. Don’t… don’t make me. Please.” Mark was begging but he didn’t care anymore. Plus, it would help his case to play it off as trauma. “It was just what I already said.”
Cecil opened his mouth, but then Mom said, broken, “But what about Chicago? Why Chicago? Why the cruise?”
Mark flinched, caught off guard. “He— he wanted to, uh, show me. Um.” He couldn’t bring himself to say the words. He didn’t even know how he would say them. Dad wanted to show me how insignificant humans are? Dad wanted to show me how breakable humans are? No. It made Mark nauseous just thinking about it. Mark wiped harshly at his eyes, as if that could erase the memories.
Cecil must have gotten the gist, and something in his face softened. “That’s okay, Mark. And we don’t need a translation right this minute. You can always do it after you’ve had some time to process.”
“Okay,” Mark managed.
Looking between Mark and Mom, Cecil stood and walked towards the exit. “I’ll leave you two to talk. Anything you need, Invincible, the GDA’s here for you.” Mark nodded weakly, and then they were alone, Mark and his mother and the empty third chair.
Mark flopped onto his bed and groaned. His mom was crying over her pizza in the next room, and Mark tried not to pay attention the best he could.
Rolling over onto his back, he considered the little white spots on the ceiling where he’d stuck glow-in-the-dark stars as a kid. It felt so weird to be back here. Dad had helped Mark put those stickers up, flying him off the ground and correcting his star placements. Sitting up, Mark reevaluated his room. Posters were tacked all over the walls, and while half of them were band or comic posters, the other half were relics from Mark’s childhood, images of nebulas and maps of the galaxy.
Now, staring at the space posters with the memory of slaughter fresh in his mind, Mark couldn’t help but feel as if they were dirty. After all, Dad had been the one to suggest which formations looked the coolest. He’d been the one to buy the oldest ones for him when Mark was a toddler. He’d been the one to sit up with Mark every night and trace pathways over the maps, endless journeys towards limitless planets.
Anger flooded Mark’s veins. Was it all a fucking trick? Evil hidden behind caring and love and bedtime stories? Dad had always joked, since birth, that Mark was more Viltrumite than he was—Mark never slept, never settled down, never cried. Maybe that was why Dad had decided to speak to Mark in the Viltrumite language. Maybe that was why Dad went through the trouble of spending time with him and training him and making him feel a little less alone in the world, all so that one day Mark could use his strength to subjugate the planet.
Mark glared at the posters, on the verge of getting up and ripping them all down, when his phone buzzed. Grabbing it off the nightstand, Mark saw it was a text from Amber: hey i heard you’re back. can we talk?
For a moment, Mark just looked at it, at a loss, when the second text came: i’m sorry.
“So,” Amber said.
“So,” Mark echoed.
They were sitting on her bed, side by side but not touching. Mark focused on a Save the World! poster on Amber’s wall.
Mark started, “Amber, I’m really sorry I lied to you. I know I messed up—”
“Look,” she cut him off, turning to face him. “I— overreacted. I’m sorry. I don’t know, I just was caught so off guard, and I was pissed, I guess, and I wish I hadn’t said any of that to you. I should have realized why you wanted to keep it a secret.”
“S’ fine,” Mark muttered.
They lapsed into silence.
“Should we just forget about it?” Amber asked. “On both our ends.”
“Yeah, sure,” Mark said, relieved, and they shared a brief smile.
Amber took a deep breath and moved her hand to cover his. “And— um. I’m sorry about your dad—”
“I’m fine,” said Mark, with a little too much force, moving his hand away. “I don’t really want to talk about it.”
Amber was taken aback for a moment, then nodded. “Okay. If you ever feel ready to talk about it though, I’m here.”
“Thanks,” Mark said, halfhearted. He looked away.
“Mark,” Amber said. “I just— I don’t blame you for anything. No one does. You know that, right?”
Mark still didn’t turn his head, staring at the little haloed globe on Amber’s poster. “Yeah, I guess.”
She pursed her lips but let it go. A pause, then: “Listen, Mark, about us… I really like you, Mark. I really do. And I do want to be with you again someday. But right now I just think we need a little time. Friends? For now?”
Mark looked back at her and half-smiled. “Yeah. I agree. Friends for now.”
“Anyways,” Amber said. “Eve told me to bring you by her treehouse when you got back.”
“Wait, you know that she’s—”
“Atom Eve? Yeah.” Amber laughed. “It’s sort of a long story. Now come on, I think William will be there too.”
“Mark!” William exclaimed, throwing his arms around Mark. “I’m so, so sorry. Are you okay?”
Mark tentatively hugged him back. “I’m fine.”
“Dude. You sure? We saw the president’s speech like two hours ago. Your dad was literally trying to take over the world.”
“The president talked about it?” Mark asked, pulling away from William.
“Uh, duh,” William said. “No offense, dude, but it’s sort of like the new 9/11. Everyone’s been going crazy for weeks.”
“Oh. Yeah, I guess.”
“Hey, Mark,” Eve said from behind William. She hugged Mark briefly, her smile sad. “It’s so good to have you back. Are you okay? Are you still injured or anything?”
“No, I’m fine. Super healing, remember?” Mark said, rubbing the back of his head awkwardly. Eve’s brow creased as she looked him up and down.
“Well, I have unlimited snacks, if that helps,” she offered.
Mark smiled. “How could it hurt?”
Eve guided Mark and Amber to her balcony table, where, true to her word, the entire tabletop was covered in chips and fruit and candy.
“Thanks, Eve,” Amber said, taking a seat. They all sat there for a moment, Mark selecting a bag of Takis while the other three eyed him, worried.
Mark glanced up at them. “What?”
“Nothing,” said Eve, a little too cheerfully, and turned towards Amber. “So, Amber, how was your first flight?”
“Crazy. And fun?” Amber replied. “But also terrifying. I was so scared of falling or hitting something. And the wind was so loud. I don’t know how you guys do it.”
“You know,” William said, “the first time Mark took me out I thought he was going to drop me or something, so I had to hold onto him the entire time.”
“Hold? Dude, you nearly choked me out. I could barely move my head.”
“It was a secure position,” William defended.
“You were clinging onto me like a spider monkey!” Mark exclaimed, gesturing with his chip bag. “No one else does that. Eve, back me up.”
Eve swallowed back her laughter and solemnly shook her head. “No, I actually have had people cling onto me like that before.”
“See!” William said, pointing at her. “She prioritizes the safety of her passengers.”
“I was rescuing her from her sixth birthday party,” Eve said.
William spluttered as the rest of them laughed. “You know what? I don’t need your negative vibes in my life.”
They talked until the sun dropped low in the sky. Mark ate somewhere in the range of fifteen chip bags. Somehow, the conversation drifted to English class.
“Mrs. Kaczinski is the worst,” Amber moaned. “Did you know she assigned us another project while you were out? Something about coding and its overlap with language arts. Coding. I have no idea what I’m going to write about.”
“Same!” Eve said through an apple. “You know what, I’m literally just going to do it the night before. I don’t care if she gives me a bad grade. I’m not going to college in the fall anyways.”
William groaned. “Lucky. The rest of us actually have to keep up our GPA, thanks. That bilingualism project last semester destroyed me. I should have just pretended to be fluent in Czech or whatever.” He paused, then straightened. “Wait. Mark, why’d you do that long-ass project if you could have just spoken in front of the class in, um, that language for five minutes?”
Mark shifted uncomfortably in his chair but laughed it off. “And what, explain to her where the language came from? ‘Oh, sorry, but I actually can’t say what language it is. I promise I didn’t make it up!’ She’d have murdered me, dude.”
Eve chuckled, but William and Amber fell silent, sitting forward in their chairs.
“Sorry,” Amber said. “But, uh, what language was it?” William and Eve watched Mark, expecting. Mark swallowed.
“My dad’s,” said Mark. “He, uh, taught it to me.”
William asked, “How did that work? Wait, does your mom speak it too?”
“Uh, no,” Mark said. “She doesn’t know it.”
“Your mom doesn’t know it?” William repeated, shocked, at the same time as Eve asked, “How’d he teach it to you?”
Mark rubbed the back of his head. “Uh, by speaking it to me? I don’t know. I don’t remember a time when I didn’t know it.”
“Oh wow, so you’re a native speaker?” Amber asked.
Mark shrugged, but William held up a hand. “Hold on. I’ve been your best friend since you were, like, six. How have I never heard you speak it before? Not even one slip-up.”
“I don’t really know, man,” said Mark. “It just—feels weird? Like wrong, to speak it in school or whatever. I’ve never spoken it with anyone who wasn’t—uh, who wasn’t my dad.”
“Actually,” Eve said, “I think I have heard you mix them up.” William had a moment to look indignant before Eve continued, “Not like in everyday life. But when you had just started doing hero work, two or three years ago, you would always say stuff weird. You would stumble over basic sentence structure whenever we were in a fight. Or you would forget words like ambush or flank all the time. Your dad trained you, right?”
Mark nodded.
“That’s probably why then. You were so used to talking about fighting and stuff like that with your dad that you didn’t know how to say it in English. Or you just weren’t used to it,” Eve said.
Amber points a Cheeto at Eve. “That makes sense.” Mark nodded again, unsettled. He hadn’t even realized Eve and other heroes had noticed he was struggling at first. Hell, he hadn’t even known he’d made that many mistakes. How many other slip-ups had occurred, unnoticed?
“But dude, how’d you even have time to even learn a whole other language?” William wondered. “We spent basically every day together after school and I never saw your dad. Unless you got up every morning at like, the asscrack of dawn or whatever. Or you time traveled.” He gasped. “Holy shit, do aliens have Time Turners?”
Amber swatted William’s arm with her Cheeto bag. “Those don’t exist, duh.” William sniped something back at her, but Mark didn’t really hear it. His hands crumpled his Lays bag.
“No, we spoke it mostly at night.”
“Then how’d you even sleep?” Eve asked around a mouthful of Doritos.
Mark watched the foil collapse in on itself in his lap. “I didn’t. We— uh, Viltrumites, that’s my species, don’t really need sleep all that much. Like an hour or so a week when I was a kid? And my dad needed it even less, but my mom had to sleep, and there weren’t any daycares open at that time, obviously, so my dad just took care of me. And— I don’t know, when I was little, we would just play in my room, or sometimes we would go to different places, or he’d just tell me stories. And then, after I got my powers, we started training. We—uh, we spent a lot of time together, I guess.” He blinked hard, keeping his head down. The others were silent.
“You know I didn’t know, right, you guys?” Mark asked despairingly. “I—I didn’t know.” He half-laughed, full of derision. “All that time, and I didn’t know. How could I not have known?”
Mark buried his head in his hands, letting the shredded bag fall to the floor. “He was my dad. I-I loved him. How did I not realize?”
“Oh, Mark,” Amber whispered. Eve came around to hug him, gently, and Mark let himself be embraced.
“There’s no way you could’ve known,” said William, standing up to hug Mark too. Amber joined him, murmuring her agreement.
“But what if I had realized sooner?” Mark’s voice was thick, but he didn’t cry, because neither he nor his dad had ever cried, because Viltrumites couldn’t. “Everything would be different. We could have stopped him.”
“We did stop him, Mark,” Amber reassured. “You did. You stopped him.”
Eve said something else, but it buzzed through Mark’s skull like high-atmo winds. He’d already heard it all from his mother.
I love you no matter what. I’m so proud of you, Mark. I trust you. You did amazing. You’re so strong. I believe you. You’re nothing like your father.
And, standing in front of the hospital room’s open door: Cecil, I know my son. He wouldn’t lie about this.
Mark focused on the forest valley beyond them, on the way the evening sun turned the river into glimmering silver, on the way the woods crackled with the sound of a thousand living beings. His friends’ arms were comforting around him. This was beautiful. Earth was beautiful. And it was worth it.
It was worth it, it was worth it, it was worth it.
It had to be.
AMANDLA
“But for xenolinguistics, the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis proves to be sort of a moot point, as we often lack access to sufficient information on multiple languages and cultures within one species. Rather, our studies should focus on the inverse: how a species’ culture, biology and thought processes influence language. This is what allows us to gain the greatest insight.” Amandla turned off the slide deck and shut down the projector. “We will discuss examples of reverse Whorfianism, or as some term it, xenobiological linguistics, during the class after our midterm. Please do not forget Paper 2 is due next Tuesday.”
Laptops clicked shut and backpacks rustled as the students gathered their things and began to file out.
“Thank God that’s over,” a student muttered to her friends as they passed Amandla’s rickety desk. Staring after them, Amandla pursed her lips, slamming her own laptop shut.
She had only just begun to place her things into her bag when she spotted Carlos walking past. “Mr. Peña,” she called, gesturing him over.
“Great lecture today, professor,” he greeted warmly.
Amandla smiled and waved the compliment off. God bless his heart. A student like him didn’t deserve to attend a university like this. “I just wanted to let you know I just got access to the most recent Harvard studies on Martian. I’ll send them over tonight.”
Carlos gasped. “Really? Thank you, professor!”
“Oh, it’s nothing,” she said. “But they’re… hefty. I recognize it’ll take you a while to read through them, so I’m willing to extend your Paper 2 deadline until a week from today.”
“Really?” Carlos said, taken aback. “I— Thank you so much. You’ve really been so helpful with this paper. I can’t owe you enough.”
“Nonsense. I’m happy to help out a student, especially an engaged and curious one such as yourself. I see a bright future ahead of you in academia. But I better have your paper by March 20th, young man.”
“Of course.” Carlos smiled.
“I look forward to your analysis,” Amandla said, then turned to see Emily Campbell approaching. Her smile grew tight. “Hello, Ms. Campbell.”
Campbell slunk up to the desk, straightening her turquoise suit jacket. Amandla eyed her suit—so garish!—with faint disdain. “Hello, Professor Khondiwe. I just— I had a question about my Paper 1 grade.”
“Yes?”
Campbell’s eyes shifted to the side. “It’s just— I was confused why I got a 50. I was just wondering if there was any way it was a mistake in the gradebook, or—”
“The only mistake,” Amandla interjected sternly, “was your decision to use Dr. Branson’s writing from his 2012 study on the evolution of Species 2031’s language in your own paper, sans attribution.” Campbell gaped, but Amandla continued. “That is plagiarism, Ms. Campbell, regardless of the words you swapped out with synonyms. And it was for that that I failed you.”
“But is there any way I could have a chance to redo it, or something? I was just really busy that week, and I promise I’ll do better this time.”
“No, Ms. Campbell. I apologize, but there is a no second chance policy for plagiarism in my classes.” Campbell’s phone beeped, then beeped again, and Campbell peeked at it. Amandla ground her jaw. “I hope in the future you are able to perform your own analyses. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I really do have to be going.”
“Oh my God!” Campbell exclaimed, not even bothering to glance up at Amandla. “What the fuck.”
“Language, Ms. Campbell,” Amandla warned. “I will not change my mind.”
“No, no, not that,” Campbell said, finally looking up at Amandla. There was panic in her eyes. She thrust her phone, open to CNN, in Amandla’s direction. “Omni-Man just attacked the US!”
Amandla read the top headline, bolded and screaming: OMNI-MAN MURDERS IMMORTAL AND ATTACKS US MILITARY JETS!
And below: IS OMNI-MAN THE GUARDIANS KILLER?
Amandla and Campbell shared a frozen glance. “Go, Ms. Campbell,” Amandla said. “Get back to your dorm right now.”
As soon as Campbell had scurried out of the lecture hall, Amandla pulled her laptop out of her bag and opened CNN. Sure enough, it was all the same. Omni-Man had turned supervillain. Omni-Man. Even Khanyiso, in that village where Mbyuiseli insisted on keeping him, had heard of Omni-Man, the great protector of the planet. What was going on?
Amandla pulled up the livestream, and a reporter’s voice came blaring into the room. “...currently fighting Invincible. We have yet to identify the language they are speaking—”
Amandla sat forward, but then, suddenly—the video of empty green fields cut to an explosion, a blast of dust tearing through a city.
“Chicago has been hit! I repeat, the Rex Tower in Chicago has been hit! A nearby skyscraper has been hit! Three blocks are being destroyed by an unknown source!”
Hands clasped over her mouth, Amandla gasped at the destruction.
“The dust has cleared. Invincible was hit through Chicago! Invincible is attempting to hold up the second skyscraper, which I am being told is a residential apartment complex! For anyone tuning in now, Omni-Man has turned on—oh my God!”
Amandla could only watch on her small screen, alone in the drafty room, as dozens of stories of homes and memories and lives crumbled to the ground. Something wet touched her hand, and she realized a tear had slipped loose. On the livestream, a blur of red flashed across the city, and then Omni-Man was hovering over Invincible.
“Omni-Man has arrived on the scene! We’re cutting to live footage now!”
The overhead view was replaced by a closer, shaky vantage point from a hundred or so feet away. Omni-Man and Invincible were arguing, surrounded by rubble and fire and bones. Pixels swarmed bloodstained spots along the ground as the cable-proofing software kicked in. The audio was patchy, but then it came in more clearly, albeit still staticky and indistinct. The argument could finally be heard, and Amandla recoiled in shock. They weren’t speaking English, true to what the announcer had said, but they weren’t speaking a human language either. She could identify nearly every human language group upon first listen, could recognize all of them, but this language belonged to none. It was fast—extremely so, to the point where the individual words themselves were indistinct—and harsh, rolling, full of vowels and clicks that Amandla barely caught among the barrage of syllables.
Omni-Man finished lecturing Invincible in that language, and then Invincible screamed something back, without hesitation. Both of them seemed to be native speakers—did they belong to the same culture? Omni-Man was an alien, obviously, from an unknown planet, but she wasn’t sure about Invincible. Amandla scrutinized them. It was hard to tell; there were, according to extraterrestrial contacts, many species that closely resembled humans. The two of them had black hair, vaguely similar skin tones, and defined musculatures—it might be a safe bet to assume they were the same species. But what species were they? And what language was it?
Splitting her screen, Amandla accessed the Harvard Xenolanguages Database. She quickly began entering parameters: spoken, 15+ syllables per second, clicks, human-similar vocalization. Best to stick with the certainties for now. She pressed Go and immediately four hundred languages popped up. Well. That wasn’t going to work then. Amandla rewound the video and listened again to the argument. Was that a fricative? A plosive? To be safe, she entered both. Twelve languages appeared, and Amandla quickly scrolled through them, eliminating them one by one. Back to the drawing board.
She hurriedly plugged in variations upon variations of parameters, but nothing appeared that matched the syllable-per-second rate nor the species description. Amandla sat back and glared at her computer.
The reporter’s voice distantly buzzed, “...The liner Ocean Delight, in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, has been destroyed by Omni-Man and Invincible. It was a trans-Polynesian cruise with 7,341 total passengers aboard…”
Amandla buried her head in her hands. Lord Above. This was a tragedy—no, beyond one. She took a moment to feel her shock and grief before refocusing. She had to find this language. Maybe it’d give her some clues, give her a five minute head start, she didn’t know. Anything was better than nothing. Amandla revised her parameters. Perhaps the base parameters were off. The rate could be slower than 15 syllables; for all she knew, the language used speed as a function of emotion and, due to the obvious rage with which it was being spoken, 15+ wasn’t representative of the norm.
Eliminating that parameter, she went through the whole gamut again. The news anchor would periodically add updates, but she wasn’t listening. With every failed combination, Amandla felt as if she was inching closer and closer to a precipice. Fear and, increasingly, excitement, warred in her chest.
Finally, sitting back, Amandla regarded the dilapidated lecture hall, tucked into the basement of an old building on the edge of their too-small campus. The website laid open and blank before her, and Amandla had to conclude the unthinkable—the thrilling—
It was an unregistered alien language. It was an unregistered alien language. And of high import. Its primary source materials were open access to boot. If Amandla could crack this, her papers would land in the top journals. She’d get recruitment offers. She’d get out of here. See what all the other linguists would say about her then.
More than that—it was new. It was unknown.
This was her chance.
“An inexplicable string of high-magnitude earthquakes occurred yesterday afternoon in the Himalayas. There is yet unconfirmed speculation it was a continuation of the Omni-Man and Invincible battle…”
Amandla ignored the TV droning on in the background and scowled at her laptop, the dean’s letter glaring up at her.
…lack of funding … insufficient interest in the xenolinguistics program … many other programs are being cut for this upcoming fall semester … considering you are the only associate professor, we think it best for you to switch to foreign languages.
Running a tired hand over her crochet braids, Amandla shut the screen. She’d been putting off replying to that for a couple days now. Maybe when Miranda came back Amandla would talk to her about it, see what she had to say. If she came back before tomorrow, that was. The GDA must be incredibly busy right now. Amandla glanced at the clock on the left bookshelf, precariously balancing on a stack of paperbacks. 1:49. It had been a while since Amandla had last stayed up this late, but she’d lost track of time scouring the Internet for any information on Omni-Man’s language. Not only did no other recorded language match it, not a single government nor scientific entity had come forward identifying it.
Amandla frowned at the TV, where the news anchors were chugging cups of coffee and interviewing the third talking head of the hour on the “mind control” theory. She clicked the remote, silencing the noise and lights. They weren’t going to learn anything new at this point.
Sighing, she reopened her laptop. Time to start on the phonetics chart.
She had just found the clearest clips of the arguments—eyewitness video had already begun popping up all over the place—when her phone rang. It must be her wife, calling to let her know she wasn’t coming home tonight. Amandla picked it up, accepting the call without looking at the screen.
“Amandla!” cried Mbyuiseli. “Look who finally picked up!”
Amandla pinched the bridge of her nose. Of course. It was almost eight in the morning in South Africa. “Hello, Mbyuiseli,” she said.
“Ha, you know I’m just joking. How have you been?” His voice was just as young and boisterous as she remembered it being all those years ago in Johannesburg.
“Good, good. My job is going very well.”
Mbyuiseli chortled. “Of course, you are a genius! I’m sure you are making a name for yourself in America.”
“Yes, I’m trying.” Mbyuiseli laughed again, and then there was a brief pause. “How have you been? How’s Khanyiso?” added Amandla, a little too late.
“Oh, you know, same as always over here. Khanyiso is very good with the calves. And in school, he is the top student out of all three villages. Must have gotten it from you, eh?”
“That’s good to hear,” Amandla said, voice softer. “Now, hey, it’s pretty late over here, so I got to—”
“It’s been a while since you’ve come home,” Mbyuiseli cut in, more serious. “Khanyiso is turning ten soon. Two months.”
Amandla gazed up at the ceiling, leaning back against the couch cushions. “Right. Yeah, of course. I remember.”
“He’s been asking if you are coming to see him then.”
What to say? “I’ll… see. My schedule is very busy. I am making that name for myself, after all.” Her tone was light, but Mbyuiseli did not laugh.
“Amandla, it’s been two years since you’ve last visited. He’s your son as much as he is mine. He has Mthobeli, but that is not the same. And Mthobeli is already busy with little Lulama.”
“I know,” Amandla sighed. “I’ll try my best.”
The smile returned to Mbyuiseli’s voice. “Very good to hear. All the clan wishes you well. And here, Khanyiso wanted to talk to you.”
She jolted off the couch cushions. “Oh, uh, I’m tired, you know, and I need to be getting to bed…”
“Nonsense, it’ll be quick! Bye, Amandla. Here he is.” A shuffling sound. Amandla rubbed her hand over her forehead, pacing the apartment.
Nothing, and then, suddenly: “Hello, Mama!”
“Hello, Khanyiso, my boy,” Amandla said, awkwardly switching into IsiXhosa. “How are you?”
Khanyiso immediately launched into a long, quick ramble, of which Amandla caught maybe four or five phrases: and then I said to Lulama that; the cattle are sooo big this year!; but then the teacher told me. Amandla made noises of encouragement and fascination, but inside she shamefully couldn’t wait for this to be over. All this time and Mbyuiseli still couldn’t be bothered to teach Khanyiso English. Amandla had grown up in Johannesburg, not the village, and while her parents had taught her some IsiXhosa, it had long vanished with time.
After a couple fumbled exchanges, Khanyiso finally asked her one last question, unfortunately one she understood all too well. “When are you coming home, Mama?”
“Soon, Khanyiso,” she said. “Don’t worry.” Or had she said ‘calm down’?
Khanyiso’s voice brightened. “Okay, Mama! Bye! Love you!”
“Love you,” Amandla replied, and then the line went dead.
She barely had a moment to stare at the phone in her hand before the front door swung open behind her. “Hey, sweetie,” Miranda said.
Amandla turned, instinctively clutching the phone to her chest. “Hey,” she greeted, noticing Miranda’s shabby hair—she always pulled it when stressed—and rumpled clothes. “How was today? What happened? Is everything okay?”
“Can’t talk for long, sorry,” Miranda said, rushing past to the bedroom. “I have to be back at work in like twenty minutes. They only let me go so I could grab an overnight bag. Today was the worst. The things I saw… ugh. But everything’s okay now, don’t worry.”
“Is Omni-Man coming back?” Amandla asked, following her, lingering in the doorway as Miranda hurried around the room, throwing clothes and toiletries into a duffel bag.
“Not as far as we know, thank God. Have you washed these yet?”
“Yeah. How many— how many are dead?”
Miranda glanced up, her eyes red-rimmed. “Too many. Along with the earthquakes in the Himalayas? Still officially unconfirmed, but somewhere around 11,000.”
“Lord,” Amandla swore softly.
“I don’t really want to talk about it right now,” said Miranda. She nodded towards Amandla’s phone. “Who were you calling?”
“Khanyiso and Mbyuiseli called. I was just chatting with them for a bit.”
“Nice. How are they doing?” Miranda pushed past Amandla, pecking her on the cheek, and headed towards the kitchen.
“Good, I think. Oh— I left you some packed meals in the fridge. And dinner’s in there too in case you want to heat it up.”
Miranda sighed in relief. “You’re a lifesaver. Love you.” She threw the Tupperwared meals into the duffel, then peered towards the bookshelf clock. “I think I have time to eat, actually.”
As Miranda microwaved a plate of pesto pasta, Amandla lowered herself onto a barstool and watched her wife move through the kitchen. “So… what language was it?”
Miranda rolled her eyes, not unkindly. “Of course that caught your ear,” she teased. Amandla half-smiled and shrugged. Setting her bowl down on the opposite side of the counter, Miranda began scarfing down the pasta. “It’s their species’s language. They’re the same species, if you didn’t know,” she explained through a mouthful of food. “And they’d never told anyone about it before, ever. Even the wife doesn’t know it.”
“The wife?”
Miranda grimaced. “Sorry, tired brain. Don’t tell anyone—well, I’m sure it’ll come out soon enough, but don’t tell anyone in the meantime. Omni-Man’s Invincible’s dad.”
That… was horrific. Amandla recalled the lightning-fast thundering blows, the blood spattered over both their faces, and winced. Father and son. What sort of parent would do that to their own child?
…But it was also huge. If they both spoke the same dialect, it would make translation of the language much easier.
“Wow,” Amandla managed. “That’s insane. Do you know yet what they were saying?”
Miranda shook her head. “No. We have no idea. There’s a civilian task force working on it, though.”
“A task force?” Amandla leaned her elbows on the countertop. “Is there any way I can get on it?”
Miranda’s fork froze halfway to her mouth. She set it down and shot Amandla an apologetic look. “I don’t think so. It’s already pretty staffed.”
“Right, of course,” said Amandla, reclining against the barstool and tucking her hands back into her lap. Sour disappointment stung the back of her throat.
Miranda reached out and took Amandla’s hand in her own. “Hey, there’ll be more chances. How about this? I’ll put in a word about your good name, so that way they call you up for the next project.”
Amandla smiled at her wife and leaned in for a kiss. “Thanks.”
Just as their lips met, Miranda’s phone buzzed. Miranda pulled away, glancing down to check. “Oh, shit. They need me back ASAP. Can you clean up the plate? Sorry, love you, be back soon,” she rushed out, already gathering her things.
The email resurfaced in Amandla’s mind. “Wait,” she called after Miranda, but the door was already swinging shut, leaving Amandla alone in the apartment once more, a half-eaten plate discarded in front of her.
Two weeks passed. Although most businesses and schools reopened within a few days, hysteria remained high as people frantically searched for answers. Roughly a week after the 13th, as people began to call it, a group of desperate hackers broke through the first layer of GDA firewalls. No truly critical information had been leaked, but true to Miranda’s words, the public discovered that Invincible was Omni-Man’s son. The number of theories grew exponentially.
But so far, and Amandla had kept a close eye on it, no one came close to publicly cracking their language, despite fifty thousand Youtube videos of amateur half-wits claiming otherwise. If she was being honest, Amandla wasn’t getting any closer either. The most she got was a half-filled phonetics chart. The problem, everyone soon realized, was that they were simply speaking too fast. Phonemes were hardly distinguishable, words even less so. Slowing the recordings down didn’t help, either: the quality was so poor from the start that it became entirely lost, rendering the clips nothing more than staticky noise.
Amandla mostly lost hope. Without even a complete phonetics chart, much less with no intelligible source material, researching the language was impossible. Instead, she threw herself into grading Paper 2s, which were, as was the norm, mostly abysmal. Carlos’s turned out quite nicely, though, as expected. Miranda was similarly consumed by her job, and Amandla saw her only five times total over the two weeks.
The protests became especially virulent, demanding answers, when suddenly, two weeks and one day after the 13th, the president gave a special address and press conference. Apparently, Omni-Man had been a sleeper agent for an intergalactic empire all the time he had been on Earth. The 13th, and before that the Guardians Massacre, had been attempts to prepare Earth for conquest. He’d attempted to recruit Invincible, who before then had allegedly no knowledge of any of this, and Invincible had, as the president said, strongly disagreed. That was certainly one way to put it, Amandla mused, contemplating the death toll in the corner of the screen. Omni-Man’s sudden departure was because Invincible had fought him off, before drawing on Omni-Man's paternal love and honor to extract a promise to never return.
Sitting on her couch afterwards, microwave meal on her lap, Amandla absentmindedly scrolled through Twitter. On the TV, the guest experts, some badly sleep-deprived national security aficionados, were discussing the news.
One was saying, “I think we should thank Invincible. He did a great, selfless thing for us. We clearly owe him our lives.”
Another interrupted. “Undoubtedly. But what about this promise? He was working for this empire for twenty years while on Earth, and who knows how many before that. Should we really be trusting paternal love to keep us safe?”
The first one argued, “Love, especially the love for one’s child, is a powerful thing. I understand you don’t have children, so—”
Amandla shut off the TV. It was much the same on Twitter. Amandla didn’t really know what to think about it herself. How could she, without direct evidence of Omni-Man's sentiments? Tipping her head back onto the couch cushions, Amandla sighed. If only those recordings had been more clear.
She’d met with the dean yesterday, too, and it seemed inevitable: she was indeed heading to foreign languages. Amandla was still trying to figure out how to present this news to Miranda. Not only would she be leaving the program she had worked so hard to build, her pay would be significantly docked as she became a regular faculty member instead of program head. They might have to move into a smaller apartment. Rent in D.C. wasn’t cheap.
Still in her hand, Amandla’s phone rang. She brought it up to check the caller I.D. Mbyuiseli had called again twice, presumably to ask about Khansiyo’s tenth birthday, but Amandla was smarter both times and let it go to voicemail. She still hadn’t listened to the messages. This time, however, it was Miranda. Speak of the devil. Amandla wasn’t really in the mood to talk to her right now, so she declined the call, only for Miranda to call again immediately. Amandla furrowed her brow. Miranda wasn’t one for wasted time; she’d only make a call twice if it was urgent. She picked up.
“Hello?”
“Hey, sorry, was I interrupting anything?” Miranda was panting hard, as if she’d just ran all the way to the secure calling center.
“No, uh, nothing. I was just busy with lunch.” Amandla sat up. “Is everything okay?”
“Yeah, great, actually. They need you here.”
“What?” Amandla stood.
“They need to expand the language task force. Emergency. I don’t really know the details; it’s not under my purview. But your name was apparently on the contact list. So they need you at the Pentagon ASAP to interview.”
Oh Lord. Amandla’s hand flew to her mouth. It was happening. “Are you sure? Is there a time? What should I wear?”
“Yeah, I’m sure. As fast as you can change and drive. Just wear your black suit.” A pause. Distant shouting. “Got to go. Love you. Good luck. Bye.” Miranda hung up.
Smoothing her rumpled suit jacket, Amandla stared at the empty chair across from her. Upon arriving at the Pentagon, guards had escorted her into a small interrogation room in a sub-basement. A single pot of flowers, bright red, sat in the middle of the steel table, shining bright plastic under the fluorescent light. She’d seen better interior decorating.
The door creaked open, and a man in a suit, around sixty years old or so, stepped through the door. “Hello. Dr. Amandla Khondiwe,” she said, straightening.
“Hello,” said the man, leaning across the table to shake her hand, firm and assertive, before sitting down. The overhead light cast shadows over heavy scarring on his right jaw. “Glad you could make it here today. I’m Mr. Smith.”
“Honored to be here,” Amandla said.
Mr. Smith hummed in acknowledgment, procuring a hefty file. He flicked through it. “Bachelor’s in linguistics at University of Cape Town, double majoring in Xenobiology. Master’s and PhD in linguistics, specializing in alien languages, from UMich. And now you’re an associate professor at…”
“Yes,” she said. “I’m looking to change universities.”
Mr. Smith set down the folder. “Tell me about your experience in xenolinguistics.”
“Well…” she began. “I’ve always been fascinated by understanding how cultures and species so different from our own communicate. So I started studying xenolinguistics in college, under Professor van der Linde during the initial flush of research into Martian…” Amandla carefully detailed the two decades of her research, stretching back to junior year of college. Mr. Smith sat there and nodded periodically.
When she finished, he asked, “And, out of curiosity, what languages do you speak?”
“English, obviously. Afrikaans, Dutch, German, Martian, Klishnor, Xyxxzal. Some IsiXhosa. Bits and pieces of five or six others.”
“Great,” Mr. Smith said, nodding. “We just have a couple assessments you need to take and then you’re on the team. But first. What is, to you, the most important thing when approaching a new language?”
Amandla hesitated. “Comprehension. In order to know in any certain terms what someone is trying to say, you must be able to first grasp the context, whether that be biological, cultural, or situational. Learning a language… it’s piecing together a story, or a puzzle, or the story of a puzzle. Everything must be seen, must fit, within the larger picture.” She nodded to herself. “And that gives you true understanding. Once you hack that, you can translate almost anything.”
Mr. Smith sat back and considered Amandla again. “Well,” he said. “I am certainly looking forward to working with you.”
Amandla left the testing room, head buzzing. Loyalty tests, fear resistance tests, lying aptitude tests… She was expecting a battery of assessments, but that had been almost too much. Mr. Smith was standing outside the door, talking on the phone.
“...and he’s been with them since 1520? Good. Keep an eye out, Donald.” He hung up and turned to face her.
“I hope you haven’t been waiting long,” said Amandla.
“No, I just got here. Follow me.” Mr. Smith turned and strode away. Amandla hurried to keep up. Mr. Smith paused at a door just down the hall, leaning in. “Sorry for the delay. Come with me.” He held open the door for a tall man to step through, so tall he had to duck his head.
When he straightened, Amandla couldn’t stop her eyebrows from flicking upwards. Professor Mikim Hill was the Harvard linguist, famous for his work documenting and researching Native American languages either on the brink of extinction or of uncontacted tribes. Even now, in his early seventies, he was a prolific researcher, still known for his speed and thoroughness. However, he had not, to her knowledge, ever worked with a xenolanguage.
“Hello,” he greeted, his voice deep and sure. He extended his hand, and Amandla shook it. “Professor Mikim Hill.”
“Pleasure to meet you,” she said. “I’m Professor Amandla Khondiwe.”
His brow wrinkled slightly, as if he were searching his memory. “I apologize, I’m not familiar with your work. What university do you teach at?”
She told him. “Ah,” he said, throwing her a tight smile.
“I’m looking to transfer soon,” Amandla said.
“Now that you’ve introduced yourselves,” Mr. Smith said, “let’s go to the task force HQ.” He led them towards a set of hidden elevators. As they descended, a small bulb above the buttons flicked on green, and he turned to face them. “Right. Mr. Smith is an alias. My name is Cecil Stedman, and I’m the director of this whole shebang. I will be personally overseeing this project. Absolute secrecy will be mandated. If anyone asks, you’re working for the government. Make something up. I don’t care what, but make it believable. We can provide the receipts. Is that understood?”
Both Amandla and Professor Hill nodded.
The elevator door dinged open, revealing a heavily reinforced concrete hallway with a series of guard postings. Director Stedman led them out into it. “Now, I expect both of you are aware what language we’re bringing you in for. Let me make something clear. I don’t care about research. I don’t care about understanding its poetry. We only need to know what they said.” Reaching a metal vault door at the end of the hallway, Director Stedman turned to face them. “The GDA—hell, the entire world may be depending on you. This is your last chance to drop out.”
Amandla pressed her lips together in confusion. What? The entire world? She glanced at Professor Hill, but he didn’t seem to know what was going on either. Neither of them said anything.
Director Stedman evaluated their faces, then nodded. He turned and typed in an obscenely long password, swiping a key bracelet as he did so. The door clicked, then swung open, smoothly, irreversibly.
It opened into a massive room, filled with rows of desktops and analysts, all hurriedly typing away with headphones on. It was eerily silent, save for the clicking of keyboards. Empty whiteboards lined the walls. The farthest one had a list, Confirmed Words. Beneath it, written neatly: Markus. Nolan. Viltrum. Amandla’s mouth grew dry.
They stepped inside. “As you can see, our resources are extensive. You will also be allowed to interview Invincible, although his cooperation has been… limited,” Director Stedman said, turning to a cluster of desks set apart from the rest, near the door. The desks were empty save one, where a middle-aged blond woman sat, surrounded by cat photos and plushies. “This is Hannah.”
Hannah looked up, and, upon spotting them, waved with a cheerful grin. “Hello there!” Amandla raised an awkward hand in greeting. Hannah returned to her typing.
“Hannah has been in charge of this task force for the last seven months,” Director Stedman said.
“Excuse me?” Professor Hill asked. “This language was discovered two weeks ago.”
The director met each of their gazes in turn, both assessing and threatening all at once. “This is beyond confidential. If you say so much as a word about anything discussed from here on in to anyone else, that will be the last word you ever speak.”
Amandla nodded warily. Professor Hill crossed his arms and motioned for Director Stedman to continue.
Director Stedman cleared his throat. “Ever since the Guardians Massacre, Omni-Man’s home has been placed under heavy surveillance. We have records of every single conversation had in that house for the last seven months. All the ones involving Invincible and Omni-Man are in the target language. That is when our investigation began.”
Amandla sucked in a breath. That was invaluable. A larger sample size would make this endeavor ten times easier, especially with minimal native cooperation. And if they could access bilingual conversations…
“What is the time frame for translating all of that?” Professor Hill inquired, eyebrows raised. He was right. Months of conversation, starting from scratch, could take a year to translate, easy.
Director Stedman shook his head. “I frankly don’t give a rat’s ass about most of it. There is only one part that we need.” He walked over to the nearest desktop, across from Hannah, and swiftly logged in. “I’m sure you’re aware that Invincible fought off his father. That, frankly, is PR bullshit.” Amandla blinked hard, taken aback.
“Invincible claims his father’s paternal love for him actually drove him to stop of his own accord. According to him, Invincible begged his father to leave the planet alone, and Omni-Man left without another word.”
Amandla’s heart thundered in her chest.
“But what Invincible doesn’t know is that after the Guardians died, we took… precautionary measures. Every superhero suit was equipped with Bluetooth recording equipment, just in case it ever happened again. Miraculously, Invincible’s mic remained undamaged.” Director Stedman pulled up an audio file and pressed play. “And so this is what really happened.”
Static. Wheezing. Invincible saying something, voice thick, stuttering over his words. He still spoke just as fast, but the quality was much clearer, clear enough for Amandla to hear each phoneme, to hear his voice hitch, the rasp of his breath, the wet squelch of blood. She shifted, uncomfortable listening to something so private. It felt forbidden. But Invincible did sound like he was begging; the story matched up.
Director Stedman caught the looks on their faces and held up a hand. “Wait.”
Then: two percussive booms in quick succession. Another. Amandla couldn’t stop her flinch. Professor Hill pressed a hand over his mouth. “Punches,” Director Stedman said.
Omni-Man snarled something, clearly furious. Amandla shuddered, but then Omni-Man’s tone suddenly leveled out. He began speaking at a smooth, even clip, almost lecturing. This went on for about a minute. Invincible occasionally gasped out short, desperate syllables.
Eventually, a moment of silence. Amandla waited for the begging to start up again. Instead—BOOM. Louder than the first three.
Director Stedman reached over and pressed pause. “And that was Omni-Man leaving.”
A moment of stillness.
“So he lied,” Amandla blurted out, eyes wide. “Invincible lied.”
“Exactly,” Director Stedman said, staring at the furthest whiteboard. Markus, Nolan, Viltrum. “But why? And what did Omni-Man say that he’s so desperate we don’t find out?”